Communication and Reporting Specialist-OTL

Work Arrangement: In-person

Job Description

The International Rescue Committee responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and helps people to survive and rebuild their lives. Founded in 1933 at the request of Albert Einstein, IRC offers life-saving care and life-changing assistance to refugees forced to flee from war or disaster. At work today in more than 40 countries and in 22 U.S. cities, IRC restores safety, dignity, and hope to millions who are uprooted by conflict or disaster. IRC leads the way from harm to home.

CONTEXTUAL BACKGROUND

The IRC has been present in Nigeria since 2012 when the organization responded to flooding in Kogi state. In February 2014 the IRC moved into Adamawa State in NE Nigeria to provide humanitarian interventions through a multi-sectoral, integrated approach for conflict-affected populations. IRC Nigeria now operates a country office in Abuja and field offices in Mubi and Yola of Adamawa State, Maiduguri and Monguno of Borno state, and Damaturu of Yobe State. Currently, IRC Nigeria implements programs for primary health care, nutrition, environmental health, women’s protection and empowerment, protection, child protection, education, food security & livelihoods.

USAID’s Opportunity to Learn (OTL) is a 5-year project that aims to address the immediate education needs of out-of-school children (OOSC) and youth in Borno and Yobe states, through safer new and existing non-formal education, while laying the groundwork for sustainable improvement of education systems at the community and government levels. The OTL goal is to ensure out-of-school children and youth in Northeastern Nigeria are safely able to gain foundational skills, including literacy, numeracy, and social and emotional skills, to progress to higher levels of education, training, and/or engagement in the workforce.

Job Overview/Summary

The Communications Specialists will support the strategy, design and implementation of communication and engagement activities to tell the impact of the projects’ activities through a range of communications approaches and deliverables, including written communication (reports, success stories, etc.), social media, photography, graphic design, outreach, and event management, etc.

This position will be embedded within the consortium team with responsibility for the communications work in the target states, as well as coordination with the wider project team to provide communications expertise and ensure consistent style, branding, and strategy across the project, in line with USAID guidelines.

Major Responsibilities

- A strong writer with sound judgement, and the ability to think creatively, solve problems, and support strategic communications activities, the communication specialist creates high-quality content for OTL’s external audience and plays an active role in promoting the project’s communications objectives. - Collaborate with the technical leads and consortium partners to ensure integration of clear communications plan and activities that complement and report on all project activities. - Responsible for providing inputs and developing content for the design, development, and management of public awareness communications programs including key messages, and communication plan for key project activities. - Supports OTL communication and outreach initiatives and planning to increase visibility and understanding of the project’s objectives, approaches, and impact. - Be creative and collaborative and encourage an open working environment where everyone is informed about project objectives and developments. - Responsible for information collection, content generation and development of communications products. - Identifies, researches, collects project information and/or analyzes data and from technical and M&E teams, to draft useful story-driven content about OTL’s multifaceted components and other engaging content (included but not limited to news stories, press releases, one pagers, fact sheets, impact/success stories, photo essays, briefs) for target audiences, including for social media. - Takes photographs, captures sound bites or video clips, and create graphics, shareables, and/or infographics as necessary to accompany project publications and social media posts. - Conducting Interviews with variety of stakeholders for the purpose of creating content for external audiences - Ensures all project deliverables and external documents are of high quality, submitted on time, and are consistent with achieving the overall communication goals and objectives. - Facilitates internal communications, maintains internal program communications files, and provides communications trainings to project staff as necessary.

Information Management and Reporting:

- The Communications and reporting specialist will support the grant and technical teams to maintain deliverable deadlines, produce high-quality drafts of publications and project deliverables for review, compile inputs to develop quarterly/annual reports, while ensuring all materials adhere to USAID guidelines (including style guide and templates).

Monitoring and Evaluation:

- Contribute to the learning objective of the project by supporting the identification, documentation and implementation of the project’s learning and adaptation framework. - Ensure effective understanding and working of the various feedback mechanisms used for gathering and reporting feedback in collaboration with the MEL team and IRC’s client responsiveness and accountability unit

Key Working Relationships

- Position Reports to: MEL Lead - Key Internal Contacts: - Country Program: Chief of party, MEL Lead, Program Lead, Consortium Leads, State program managers and Education Officers - Key External Contacts: Media, project stakeholders, public

Qualifications

- Masters or Bachelor’s degree in communications, international development, journalism, public relations, or related field. - A minimum of five (5) years of professional experience in communications and outreach, including experience in managing the design and implementation of communications plans. - Experience and knowledge of USAID funding, its contractual and reporting requirements is a strong asset. - Proven ability to multitask with strong attention to details. - Excellent management, organization, problem-solving, and decision-making skills - Demonstrated ability to work under deadline pressure and manage production schedules. - Ability to work independently and as part of a team. - Strong knowledge of MS Office applications such as Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook, and SharePoint are required; familiarity with web management tools and video editing and photo manipulation tools is desirable - Fluent written and oral English is required. Fluency in Hausa, Kanuri and Fulfulde is desired.

Ability to Travel: At least once every quarter to states of implementation will be required.

Standards of Professional Conduct: the IRC and IRC workers must adhere to the values and principles outlined in the IRC Way – Code of Conduct. These are Integrity, Service, and Accountability. In accordance with these values, the IRC operates and enforces policies on Beneficiary Protection from Exploitation and Abuse, Child Safeguarding, Harassment-Free Workplace, Fiscal Integrity, Anti-Retaliation, Combating Trafficking in Persons and several others.

Gender Equality****: IRC is committed to narrowing the gender gap in leadership positions. We offer benefits that provide an enabling environment for women to participate in our workforce including parental leave, gender-sensitive security protocols and other supportive benefits and allowances.

Working Environment

IRC is an Equal Opportunity Employer. IRC considers all applicants on the basis of merit without regard to race, sex, color, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability or any other characteristic protected by applicable law